Scottish Power not billing me correctly, in fact, not at all!

louize1983

Hi, 

Just wondered what other people would do in a similar situation, or advice please.

So back in March of this year, I was lucky enough to have bought my first home. One moving into the property, we signed up to Scottish Power, who at the time seemed to have the cheapest tarriff. Our house when we first moved in had a normal electricity meter, and a PAYG gas meter. Knowing that the tariffs on PAYG meters tend to be higher than paying for energy via direct debit, we looked to switch over to a normal gas meter as soon as possible. After about two months of failed attempts trying to get our meter swapped out with Scottish Power, and cancelled appointments, my partner directly contact SGN who arranged to swap the meter out for us. I assumed at the time that Scottish Power would somehow be able to see this as having happened.

Anyway, fast forward a couple of months, I was checking back on my bank transactions, and noticed that as a two person household, we are currently paying £92 a month in direct debits to Scottish power. Note that during my whole time in my new house, up until now, Ive not received any statements from Scottish Power, and had been locked out of my online account so couldnt see what Id been billed for. The odd phone call to Scottish Power about my online account being inaccessible didnt yield any results, I was often on hold for upwards of 40 mins without ever having spoken to someone so would give up.

Anyway, after being on hold for a lifetime over what I thought I was an extortionate amount to have to pay for gas and electric every month, in a two person working household, it came to light that Scottish Power were only billing me for electricity. So this is more extortionate than I thought!!!!! But to balance it out, after getting them to send me paper statements, they do indeed still believe we have a PAYG gas meter. How can that be??? Im not sure how that system works on Scottish Powers end, shouldnt they see payments being made to them if we were topping up gas by card?? It even said how much we had topped up this non existent meter within the past two months.

So really im not sure what to do. I was perhaps thinking of waiting till im no longer in debit, then switching suppliers and starting from scratch, paying for both electricity and gas on direct debits.

And also, what are peoples thoughts on a £92 a month direct debit?? We have a three bed house, there are only two of us, so during the week we are both at work and then have a few hours in the evening before going to bed. I know energy prices have risen, but £92???! On the whole, I wouldnt say we use that much electric. Our oven/hob are gas supplied, and then of course theres the normal stuff like lighting and tvs whilst home.

Does anyone know how the PAYG meters work, at the suppliers end? Also, my electricity meter has a smart meter. In our previous property we also had a smart meter with EDF for a short while, for gas and electric, who we left after a dispute when the billed us a massive £400 as their billing system hadnt not been working correctly, and we were told that even though properties have smart meters, we are still obliged and responsible for sending the company meter readings.

JGB1955

Were Scottish Power the existing supplier to the property when you moved in?

louize1983

JGB1955 said:

Were Scottish Power the existing supplier to the property when you moved in?

No, they werent. I cant remember who the suppliers were now, may have been eon? on the both the PAYG gas meter and the electricity.

Curiousgirl1

You need to speak to Scottish Power again. If your meter has been exchanged then the serial number on the meter in your property will be different to the one on their system. 

Not sure why SGN would come out to exchange the meter without telling you to go through your supplier unless you told them you could smell gas & it was done on an emergency. 

If this was the case networks don’t always send the info to the supplier so SP could be unaware it’s been changed. 

Don’t know why SP didn’t just do a mode change if you had a PAYG meter in the first place 

molerat

Firstly check here

https://www.findmysupplier.energy/

and here

https://www.energynetworks.org/operating-the-networks/whos-my-network-operator

to find out who is actually supplying energy to the property.  If SP were not already the suppliers at the time you moved in, the supplier at the time had the legal right to supply the property, that could be where your problems stem from.

louize1983

Curiousgirl1 said:

You need to speak to Scottish Power again. If your meter has been exchanged then the serial number on the meter in your property will be different to the one on their system. 

Not sure why SGN would come out to exchange the meter without telling you to go through your supplier unless you told them you could smell gas & it was done on an emergency. 

If this was the case networks don’t always send the info to the supplier so SP could be unaware it’s been changed. 

Don’t know why SP didn’t just do a mode change if you had a PAYG meter in the first place 

They did offer to put us on a cheaper PAYG tariff, but it was still the more expensive option compared to tariffs on a "normal" energy meter. They said they couldnt offer anything cheaper until we had a "normal" gas meter put in.

louize1983

molerat said:

Firstly check here

and here

to find out who is actually supplying energy to the property.  If SP were not already the suppliers at the time you moved in, the supplier at the time had the legal right to supply the property, that could be where your problems stem from.

Thanks, thats really useful! Ive just checked, and it is indeed Scottish Power who are my supplier.

louize1983

molerat said:

Firstly check here

and here

to find out who is actually supplying energy to the property.  If SP were not already the suppliers at the time you moved in, the supplier at the time had the legal right to supply the property, that could be where your problems stem from.

Also, I had a statement in the post from Scottish Power, for both the Gas and Electricity. The Gas statement says that I have a PAYG meter and have topped up £70s worth in the last two months.

Curiousgirl1

louize1983 said:

molerat said:

Firstly check here

and here

to find out who is actually supplying energy to the property.  If SP were not already the suppliers at the time you moved in, the supplier at the time had the legal right to supply the property, that could be where your problems stem from.

Also, I had a statement in the post from Scottish Power, for both the Gas and Electricity. The Gas statement says that I have a PAYG meter and have topped up £70s worth in the last two months.

Not sure if it works this way but wondering if your old meter has been installed in a different property & because it’s still showing on your account, the top ups that the new people are doing is being shown as yours. 

Check the serial number on your statement with the one on your meter & see if it’s different & let us know. 

You really need to speak to SP to get this sorted, can’t really be done any other way. 

EssexHebridean

On the electricity use, it’s difficult to establish reasonable cost working purely with the DD figure - but assuming that the electric is on the standard variable tariff, not an expensive fix, I’d find it hard to believe that you could be using that much assuming that you heat using gas. 

We’re an (almost) all electric house - we just use gas for cooking - and we don’t pay that much monthly for our electric. We are also a two person household with one of us currently WFH 3 days a week. You really need your usage figures though to see if there is something odd going on. First job is to go back over your meter readings and workout what you think it should be costing you given the unit rate and standing charge on your tariff. If it does turnout to be that high then my first question would be do you have an immersion heater left switched on all the time? 

louize1983

EssexHebridean said:

On the electricity use, it’s difficult to establish reasonable cost working purely with the DD figure - but assuming that the electric is on the standard variable tariff, not an expensive fix, I’d find it hard to believe that you could be using that much assuming that you heat using gas. 

We’re an (almost) all electric house - we just use gas for cooking - and we don’t pay that much monthly for our electric. We are also a two person household with one of us currently WFH 3 days a week. You really need your usage figures though to see if there is something odd going on. First job is to go back over your meter readings and workout what you think it should be costing you given the unit rate and standing charge on your tariff. If it does turnout to be that high then my first question would be do you have an immersion heater left switched on all the time? 

Thank you for your reply. No, we havent got anything like immersion heaters, nothing like that all. Nothings left on standby, the only things that are constantly powered are the fridge and boiler. Our house is heated by gas, and both oven/hob are gas. My partner was on the phone for ages with Scottish Power, trying to negotiate a cheaper tariff, and at the end of all the spiel was told our direct debit may increase. Which didnt go down well as we are currently paying £92 a month. Arguing with them over the tariff and the fact we had a normal gas meter installed, but to hear the person insist we are PAYG, he terminated the phone call.